Category: Blog

If you are the owner or manager of an online business in Malaysia, you are going to need a reliable email hosting service for communication purposes. Always keep in mind that email remains the most efficient way to communicate with your employees, customers, and business partners. Below are the most important factors you need to consider when looking for a good and reliable email service provider:

Administration and ease of use

Generally speaking, you should have complete control over the management of your emails. The provider simply gives you the platform, and you should have the freedom to use it in any way you want. This is particularly the case for business websites wherein you have to customize your emails depending on your customer base.

Security

Email hacking and phishing remain the two most common ways in which hackers steal sensitive data. The email host you hire should have tight security measures in place to prevent these hacking attacks. One way of determining if a provider has stringent security measures is to ask for their security certifications.

Archiving and storage capabilities

You should be able to easily categorize your messages based on a particular set of criteria. For instance, you should have the ability to separate customer emails from the ones sent by business partners. And of course, there should be enough storage space should you decide to save and archive all incoming messages.

The efficiency of customer support

Email systems can sometimes go down. In these instances, you can lose a lot of clients and potential sales. The damage can be minimized if the problem is fixed as soon as you send a support ticket. That said, you need an email provider that employs a team of experienced and vigilant support technicians.

If an email service provider passes the test with regards to the factors mentioned above, then it’s a good fit for your business. It’s advisable that you try the service for some time before you fully commit to it. The majority of email hosting companies offer free trials wherein you get to experience the features and functions of the service before you decide to purchase it. You should take full advantage of these free trials.

Malaysia is greatly focused on bringing its tech forward, and that’s why most of its population is always connected to the internet. And where there are lots of people, there are lots of businesses looking to engage potential buyers. These days, nearly every business in Malaysia has a website to its name to help widen its reach and persuade prospects towards profitable consumer action. Unfortunately for some business owners, while a website does seem like a great way to interact with a target market, owning and managing one isn’t quite as simple. Before you buy a domain, be sure to read through these 6 must-know facts to help ease the process of owning a website.

Downtime Can Cost Money – Once you start managing your website, it will become apparent that every second that it’s available to your market counts. It’s ideal to shop around for only the best web hosting services in Malaysia to ensure your website is up and running 24/7, especially if you cater to worldwide consumers. 2. Regular Maintenance is Required – Tech is always changing, and that’s why you need to update your codes on a regular basis. Be sure to have your website checked and maintained by an IT professional at least once a month to keep it up to date with the latest best practices. 3. You Get What You Pay For – Just because you know a guy who made a website once as a school project doesn’t mean you should hire him to do yours for a lower cost. Trust only professional web designers and coders, because the quality of your site will determine how well your market interacts with it. 4. The Internet is a Big Place – If you thought you could put up a website and it would be easily found by your market, you thought wrong. The internet is a big, big place and there are millions of other websites out there. That’s why aside from the website itself, you may also have to invest in SEO.5. It Takes Time – Websites aren’t made overnight. Development time can take a while but often, developers struggle to meet deadlines, not because of their own mistakes and lapses but because clients failed to sign documents, send important pictures, or respond to design concerns sooner. Be sure to coordinate with your developer and answer their emails or messages as soon as possible to prevent any road blocks.

6. There will Always Be Problems – Visitors and online shoppers will almost always encounter problems while buying things off of your website. It’s ideal to have a dedicated website manager available at all times to address any issues and concerns visitors might have while navigating through the different pages.

No doubt, owning and managing a website can be a challenge. But with the right know-how, you can make the entire process problem-free. Keep these 6 facts in mind when you start to set up your site and get nothing but the best out of your little corner of the internet.

Your web-based business needs one critical piece of equipment to exist — a server. Even when you own the server, if it is located at a business providing server-hosting services instead of where you do business, you are taking part in colocation hosting.

You get more bandwidth at a much lower price than when hosting at your business. That’s because colocation hosting sites usually have a premium bandwidth to ensure fast loading times for your website.

Better Power Backup and Security

Your colocation host typically has excellent power back-up services available during power outages. That means your website won’t crash just because a power line is down. You also will benefit from the most advanced security to prevent hacks and other attacks on your server.

Easier to Upgrade

When you take part in colocation hosting, the server belongs to you. That means you can switch it out anytime you want to upgrade your server and what it can do for your business.

Cons:

Higher Startup Cost

Because you are using your own server, it will cost you more to set up your website or migrate it to your own server than when using a web-hosting service. You also need to buy your own hardware and software, which means higher initial costs to do business.

Colocation Services Vary

Not all colocation services are the same, and you will have to perform a diligent search to ensure you get the right server colocation in Malaysia. Among factors to consider are cost, proximity to your business, and services provided.

Higher Maintenance Costs

When you own a server, you have to maintain it. That means you have to pay someone to maintain your off-site server, and that can be costly. You also might have down times while your server is maintained, and that can mean lost business and higher costs.

When choosing whether to use colocation hosting or opting for a web-hosting service provider, you need to assess your business needs versus the pros and cons of colocation hosting. When the services and security provided outweigh the cost to obtain them via colocation hosting, it might be the right choice for you.

With so many service providers and options that are available today, choosing a reliable web host isn’t easy. Throw in a multitude of features and benefits of each provider into the mix, and it becomes that much harder to decide.

But that doesn’t have to happen. Let us take a moment to sit back and take a look at some of the more common features that a good web hosting provider can offer:

Disk Space and Bandwidth

As its name suggests, disk space refers to the amount of storage space that has been assigned to you by the free web hosting provider. Your web site files, which include text, images, audio will all be stored here. Bandwidth on the hand refers to the amount of traffic (visitors) that are allowed to access or leave your site at a given time. Access refers to every time a visitor searches for your website on their browser while leave happens when a visitor receives something. Whether it is to view an image, listen to a particular audio file or if it’s to download something, this can be classified as leaving.

Website Creator and FTP

If you have little to no knowledge of all this web creation, look no further as many free web hosting providers now come equipped with templates that you may choose to customize your site on.

FTP on the other hand means File Transfer Protocol. It is the process of transferring files from your website to your computer, or vice versa. This protocol is integral in ensuring that your content gets uploaded in a timely many. It also lets you download files that are stored on your website to be downloaded to your computer. A good free web hosting provider should grant you 24/7 access to unrestricted FTP.

Email

Yes, your free web hosting provider should also provide you with an email service. This would enable you to setup emails that are centered around your website, i.e: user@leetgamers.asia. With a webmail interface, you are free to login and manage your emails by using your browser. The email service should also provide you with POP3 and SMTP access so you can setup and manage your emails by mobile devices whenever preferred.

Support and Uptime

It is important to consider a free web hosting service that has free, reliable customer and email support.

While no host can offer you 100% guaranteed uptime (as conditions such as power outage is beyond their control) they should provide “counteractive measures” to limit website and email downtime to a minimum.

Price

If you’re on the lookout for a free web hosting provider, an important point to note is that you shouldn’t have to pay a cent for the basic features listed above. A free web hosting provider that forces banner ads on your site, is a huge red flag and should be avoided.

With a multitude of web hosting options so readily available today; free web hosting, shared hosting, dedicated servers, the list just goes on. But at the end of the day, these options serve one primary focus, which to host your content so that it can be accessed and viewed by anyone on the Web. The key traits that set them apart is how each of them are structured as well as the overall benefits that they offer.

Let’s take a moment to go through each of them.

Free Web Hosting

Yes, what could be better than a free web hosting plan? With its rather barebones functionality, this plan is best suited for somebody who wants to create a homepage or a small website to share with close friends and family. While free web hosting has its fair share of criticisms for the lack of features, security and customer support, there are a few reliable providers in which you can trust. Do keep in mind that free web hosting is geared to giving you a taste of what it’s like having a small, personalized website. Should you feel trapped within the confines by the lack of features that free web hosting has to offer, upgrading is the way to go.

Shared Web Hosting

Like its namesake, shared hosting is basically a platform where you are sharing a space on a web server with other users. As multiple clients are bearing the cost of the server, this is the most cost efficient and popular solution for personal users and small businesses to set up blogs, e-commerce and other online platforms. However, there are a few setbacks. For one, being on the same shared server, you’re unwittingly exposed to all the activities of your neighbours. If someone makes a huge scripting mistake, it could cost the whole server to be off the grid until a solution is found. If a site has a huge surge of online visitors, your site might a while to load as a result. And that in turn could discourage visitors and potential clients from browsing through your site altogether.

Dedicated Hosting

When your business starts to flourish and require more sharing server resources, it’s time for an upgrade. With a whole dedicated server built and running just for you, the sky’s the limit for what can be achieved. However, without any experience, succeeding with this hosting alternative is next to impossible – those who require a dedicated server but don’t have the technical know-how can seek out the help of a managed hosting option. With this option, the hosting service handles all the management tasks, leaving you to focus solely on the areas pertaining to business. Do keep in mind that a managed service is considerably more expensive.

Which option is right for you?

It is in your best interests to know what you’re getting into. Free services are better suited for personal sites, shared hosting complements small businesses well while dedicated servers is designed for larger hosting needs, yet is the most expensive. By knowing what is needed for your site, it can help you determine which type of web hosting is the best alternative.